Tennessee pharmacies sell potent ivermectin, led by anti-vaccine doctor who’s taken ‘bucketloads’

Tennessee’s 2022 law made it the first U.S. state to permit pharmacies to sell ivermectin—a drug approved for parasitic infections—without a prescription. The state now has roadside pharmacies and billboards advertising the medication, often in concentrations 10 or 20 times stronger than standard doses. While ivermectin is FDA-approved for treating parasites like river blindness, it has been widely promoted by anti-vaccine activists and fringe doctors as a COVID-19 treatment, despite clinical trials confirming its ineffectiveness. The law was pushed through by a Republican supermajority, bypassing state medical officials and granting pharmacists legal immunity for prescribing ivermectin. Some pharmacies now market it for unproven uses, including ‘long haul vax symptoms,’ diabetes, and cancer, despite no scientific evidence supporting these claims. Critics, including UCLA physician John Mafi, warn that the law could divert patients from proven treatments. Ivermectin’s popularity surged during the pandemic, becoming an ‘ideological flag’ for conservatives and followers of the ‘Make America Healthy Again’ movement, led by figures like Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and former Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, who recently amplified false claims about its effectiveness against hantavirus. The World Health Organization has found no research supporting these assertions. Tennessee’s law has inspired similar legislation in over two dozen other states, turning ivermectin into a symbol of resistance against mainstream medicine. Experts like University of Alberta professor Timothy Caulfield attribute its rise to profit motives, political identity, and distrust in biomedical institutions. The drug’s unregulated sale continues to raise concerns about public health risks and misinformation.